Well, well, well it looks like criminal activity may be coming home to roost for the Sanders family. Jane Sanders’, wife of the illustrious Vermont Senator and former presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders. Jane is being investigated for her role in the possible fraudulent acquisition of nearly $7 million in tax-exempt bonds when she was the president of Burlington College.

Jane’s actions, which she labeled under expansion and fundraising, ultimately bankrupted the small, private school in Vermont, forcing it to permanently close its doors in 2016.

The employee subpoenaed was former Dean of Operations for the now defunct Burlington College, Coralee Holm, stated to The Vermont Journalism Trust that she was questioned about the fundraising activities related to the expansion of the college headed up by Jane Sanders.

According to the emails obtained via the FOIA request as well as the testimony of Holm, Jane Sanders was the mastermind of the expansion plan. Jane was the president of Burlington College from 2004 to 2011 and this expansion plan was supposed to more than double the enrollment of the school, taking it from about 200 full-time students to over 400. However, that plan came with a hefty price tag, forcing the school to take on $10 million in debt to finance the purchase of an expansive new campus. The real estate purchase backfired in epic fashion, ultimately leading to Jane leaving the college and its financial collapse.

Burlington College was founding in 1972 and consistently had fewer than 300 students throughout its history. The school catered to a niche market interested in its study abroad program that offered the rare opportunity to study in places like Cuba. Throughout the existence of the school, it had virtually no endowment and an annual budget of roughly $4 million.

The expansion plan involved the purchase of a 33-acre plot on the shores of Lake Champlain owned by the Catholic Diocese of Burlington. The diocese was selling the property to help pay for a $17 million settlement of several sex-abuse lawsuits. In order to finance the purchase, the school made a case to the Vermont Educational and Health Buildings Finance Agency. This agency issues tax-exempt state bonds for the benefit of nonprofit institutions such as schools or hospitals.

People’s Bank then, in turn, gave their agreement to purchase the bonds, contingent upon minimum commitments of $2.27 million in grants and donations prior to closing. Jane presented to the Bank and the agency that the school had lined up multiple donors ready to hand over their hard earned cash to the tune of $2.6 million, promising in time, more donors would be forthcoming. With this pledge, the state agency granted the school $6.7 million in tax-exempt bonds in 2010.

Holm states –

“They were asking for documentation about the fundraising that had occurred before the college had moved to its new location.”

The feds took possession of a “filing cabinet full of donor files,” according to Holm, thought she states she turned over all the emails she had received from Jane to the FBI.

Of course, the donations promised never materialized as promised, in fact, from 2010 to 2014 the school received a sum total of $676,000 in donations — nowhere near the $2.6 million in donations Jane Sanders promised.

Even more suspect Christine Plunkett, Jane’s successor as Burlington College president, expressed surprise about the significant lack of donations according to interviews given to local CBS affiliate WCAX-TV. More interesting, Plunkett was the vice-president for administration and finance during Jane’s tenure as president of the school. Would she not have had access to all of these records as well?

On Sep. 26, 2011, less than a year after orchestrating the property purchase and with two years remaining in her contract, Jane Sanders abruptly resigned as president of Burlington College. Jane’s lawyers and the school reached a settlement several days after her resignation. Under the settlement, she collected a roughly $200,000 severance package.

Of course, Jane denies any and all implications of wrong doing with denial claims that would do Washington proud, stating that the school gave the state finance agency “very clear indications of what money was in hand, what money was expected, what money was absolutely not able to be revoked so I don’t know what to tell you.”